Resurgemus
by Xx Clear Dawnlight xX
Summary: A sequel to my story Fade to Black.
1. Renatio

Wow. I have to admit, it feels really surreal to actually be uploading this.

Several readers, both here and on dA, asked for this. I racked my brains. I grumbled. I wrote. I got Writer's Block. I cursed profusely in thirteen different languages. I got over my Writer's Block. I got more Writer's Block over something else. And, eventually... I finished it.

And here it is. A sequel to _Fade to Black_. A sequel. Not _the_ sequel.

There are two. The other is titled _Broken Treasure_ and is by the utterly amazing Sister-to-the-Queen. She will upload the first chapter tomorrow, and I insist that you all go and read that one too.

And on that note, early though it may be... there are several people that I owe a great deal of thanks to. One of them, of course, is Sister-to-the-Queen, for sticking by me the whole time I was writing this, being patient, putting my fears to rest, for titling this thing and all of its chapters and taking on the painstaking task of beta-ing this monster and beating the evil out of it. I can honestly say that this story would not be as good without her.

The second is my dear friend Pen Sil, who, even though I still haven't allowed her to read this piece, helped me to write several scenes in it, including the beginning scene of Chapter 9. And also kicked me in the head every time I started procrastinating. Without her, this story probably _still_ wouldn't be finished.

The final person to thank is Haizea, my best friend, for putting up with my incessant babble regarding this story and my Writer's Block, and for not murdering me yet. xD You're the best, Lady Zed!

In any case. -ahem-

'Resurgemus' translates to 'We will rise again', and 'Renatio' is Latin for 'Rebirth'

I do not own _Good Omens_. That belongs to Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. I don't own Aziraphale, Crowley, Azrael or God. They, too, belong to Pratchett and Gaiman.

I do, however, own all the other characters in this story.

And without further ado... I hope you all enjoy _Resurgemus_.

* * *

The sun was slowly making its way down from the highest point, dark clouds beginning to gather on the horizon.

Grey eyes as old as time, their bright blue long since faded, opened, dispelling the images that haunted him. A hand lifted to push back tangled blonde hair, moved down to cover the eyes for a moment, curled around lips and chin, and finally came down to rest on his lap. He stood, moving to the window, eyes blankly taking in the oncoming storm. There was another patch of darkness in his memory today.

Fading… It was all fading away… Life drifted further and further out of his reach with each passing day, each passing second, until he'd almost forgotten what it had felt like to really and truly live. He felt lost inside himself, his mind trapped inside its own thoughts like a cage, the blackness closing in on him.

He'd lost all will to live. He felt numb. Nothing mattered any more. He had nothing left to give to the world. He'd tried, God knew how hard he'd tried to keep going, to keep giving, but there was nothing there anymore. He'd burned out, finally reached the end of what he could manage. There was nothing left for him, nothing to tie him to the world. He was alone and empty. The love he'd once felt for humanity was gone, replaced with… nothing. Not even hatred. Just nothing. Numbness. Emptiness. He longed for an end, longed to be free.

Nothing was the way it used to be, back when he'd been happy. There was a hole inside him, a place where something had been ripped away. He missed the absent part of him, missed the person that it represented. He was lost in darkness, in emptiness, a part of him still refusing to believe that it was real, still expecting to wake up from the nightmare. He couldn't stand the empty feeling that was filling him to the point of agony, until it felt like Hell. The darkness that grew inside him, around him, that darkness that swallowed him took every speck of light left, every tiny hope, every happy thought, everything that kept him going, until he wasn't him anymore, until he wasn't anyone any more, until all that was left was nothing but the unshakable, undeniable, unbearable knowledge of the truth, of the fact that _he was gone._

He turned, moving haltingly towards the door to the shop.

A tiny part of him wondered if he could save himself from the darkness and the endless despair, knew that he could have saved himself, but it was too late… He couldn't think, couldn't think why he should even try. There was nothing, no reason. His duty, the only thing that had kept him going through a thousand lonely years, was gone. God had forsaken him. He was alone in the darkness, trapped in an endless Hell of Today, with only the endless Hell of Tomorrow to greet him. Yesterday, the days when he had been happy, when he had loved and been loved, when he knew, the days before the darkness came, felt as if they had never existed. He could barely remember them, couldn't remember what happiness felt like and barely remembered what it even was. He stepped over the threshold. What was the _point_?

And with that question, his mind snapped and he screamed. Behind him, the bookshop that had been his hiding place for the last thousand years burst into flame in response to his anguished shriek. The books were nothing. Paper and ink. Who cared? Not him.

The heavens opened and drenched him. The cold water should have numbed him, but he couldn't feel it. He was already too numb, too far gone. The flames danced behind him, resisting their very nature, burning, blazing, hotter, brighter, crackling and hissing in defiance as the rain fell on them, refusing to be extinguished. He didn't feel the heat of the blazing inferno behind him. He didn't see the terrified looks of the villagers. There was only fury.

The Shadows took him and it felt like Death. It was welcoming. The world faded, the walls closed in. Emptiness engulfed him… and he felt nothing. Saw nothing. Knew nothing. He was broken, and he didn't know or care. All that existed was darkness and numbness. It was as good as Death, as good as the end.

He welcomed it.

* * *

He didn't know how much later it was that something disturbed his world of darkness. He didn't know how long he had wandered, lost, seeing nothing, feeling nothing. It came suddenly, breaking through the darkness. It was something he had not felt for so long that he couldn't find the word for it at first. In confusion, he looked down to see the sword that had pierced his breast, his mind searching for a word, the word to describe the sensation.

Pain. It was pain.

He raised a hand to touch the sword, his brow furrowing at the beautiful silver flames that danced along the blade. Silver… That was divine fire… But… he was… Why did it hurt?

The answer hit him. The anger that had consumed him, the darkness that had swallowed him…

He had Fallen.

As the pain spread through his body, it was followed by a sort of relief as he realised that the agonising stillness and darkness would finally end. He looked up, meeting the green gaze of the young angel, and smiled peacefully before closing his eyes as the divine fire burned away at his core, at his soul, and he turned to dust and scattered. The world faded to nothing…

* * *

In a dark room that existed on a plane outside of our own, a pulsing orb began to dim and scatter, the sparkling sand that danced inside it falling still and dark, only to stop as it was surrounded by ethereal power. A figure in a dark robe materialised out of the darkness in response to a call unheard by any ears other than his own.

_Find them. _The voice echoed around the space, loud and yet soft at the same time, and filled with sadness so great it was impossible for any human to understand. _You know what to do._

The figure nodded, raising a bony hand to capture the orb, and turned, catching another orb, similarly cloaked in ethereal power, almost absent-mindedly, and fading back into the darkness.

It was time for Azrael, the Angel of Death, to enter the Void once more.

* * *

He floated in the emptiness, straying far out of thought and time. He was not conscious of how long he spent there. He did not care. It did not matter. In this place, time meant nothing, thought had no significance. It was as if he did not even exist. It was peaceful, in a strange way. Pain did not exist, nor numbness or sadness. There was naught there but nothing.

Nothing – the complete and utter lack of any matter - is not a concept that the human mind is equipped to deal with. When faced with the idea of 'nothing', the human mind tends to imagine blackness, a darkness so absolute that nothing can be seen. This is wrong. Darkness in itself is something, and so it cannot be nothing.

He drifted in nothingness, not thinking, not feeling. He did not know how much later it was that the vacuum was disturbed. Time was nothing, meant nothing.

He hung in the void forever, yet for no time at all.

The sound that disturbed him was a sheepish cough.

He twitched limbs that he'd forgotten he had – limbs that he shouldn't have had – and opened eyes that he didn't have. The being in front of him (or was it? He couldn't tell) was familiar. His mind searched for the name, he opened a mouth that hadn't existed a moment before, spoke words that hadn't been a second ago. "Azrael… Angel of Death."

YES.

"Who… Who am I?"

YOU ARE NO ONE.

"Who was I?"

THAT YOU MUST REMEMBER ON YOUR OWN.

His mind sought a name that wasn't, a name that he hadn't used in millennia.

"…Aziraphale," he croaked.

Death nodded. AZIRAPHALE, PRINCIPALITY. FORMER CHERUB AND GUARDIAN OF THE EASTERN GATE, he said.

The former angel sought the memories of his life. Bits and pieces floated hazily through his mind. He remembered the pain of being stabbed through the chest, shuddered at the memory of the agony of his soul being eaten away by divine fire.

"I thought that… I died…"

YOU DID.

"I shouldn't exist… any more…"

The skull looked – somehow – embarrassed. AH. WELL. YES. IT'S ALL RATHER EMBARRASSING, ACTUALLY… IT WAS A BIT OF A BUGGER TRYING TO FIND YOU, I MUST SAY. He produced an object from his robe. It was a pulsing orb of light. Grains of sand sparkled as they lay still at the bottom. Aziraphale gasped. "Is that -"

YES

"I thought that they turned to ash when we died…"

THEY DO. YOURS WAS PRESERVED, AND THUS YOUR SOUL REMAINED UNTIL I WAS ABLE TO GET HERE. AS LONG AS THE HOURGLASS EXISTS, THE SOUL EXISTS, AND AS LONG AS THE SOUL EXISTS, THE HOURGLASS EXISTS. IT IS A DIFFICULT CONCEPT.

"Preserved? By who?"

THE CREATOR.

Aziraphale looked away. "Impossible," he whispered softly. "He forgot me a long time ago."

THEY SAY THAT HE NEVER FORGETS ONE OF HIS CHILDREN. YOU'VE BEEN GIVEN A SECOND CHANCE.

"A second… chance? Why?"

I WOULD NOT PRESUME TO KNOW. IT MUST BE A PART OF THE PLAN.

A small smile graced the former angel's lips as if he had just remembered an old joke. He found the familiar words. "The Ineffable Plan…"

CERTAINLY. Death sounded puzzled. He turned his attention back to the object cupped in his fingers.

Aziraphale itched to touch the glowing orb, but he held back. "What will you -"

WATCH. Death's skeletal fingers danced over the orb. The throbbing radiance faded away as, under his skilled touch, it was reshaped, the light turning to glass as the orb reformed into an hourglass. The sand still lay at the bottom, no longer sparkling.

The skeleton raised his skull to look at the soul of the former angel. COME.

Aziraphale made to follow, but they didn't seem to have moved at all when they found themselves at a doorway – well, more of a glowing rent in the nothingness than a door, but a doorway nevertheless.

Death held out a hand to usher him through. GO.

Aziraphale took a halting step forwards.

AND… AZIRAPHALE?

He looked over to the skeleton. "Yes?"

GOOD LUCK.

"Thanks…"

He reached out tentatively with one hand, touching the light, and bit back a gasp as his hand passed straight through. It was warm and comforting. He had long forgotten what those sensations felt like – what anything felt like, really.

I SHOULD HURRY, IF I WERE YOU, advised Death. YOU ARE BEING CONCEIVED RIGHT ABOUT NOW.

Aziraphale nodded and stepped into the doorway, his voice echoing back with a startled "_What_?" as Death's words sank in.

Death grinned – not that he had much choice – and turned the hourglass over in his hand. The sand began to fall again. He slipped it back into his robe and drew out a second orb, this one pulsing with darkness. NOW, he mused, TO FIND THE OTHER ONE…

* * *

Chapter 2, _Regiones Somnii_, will be uploaded this time next week.

Yeah, I know. I'm evil to make you all wait that long.

See ya next week, peeps.


	2. Regiones Somnii

Well, hello there. =P

Title translates to 'Regions of Dream', or 'Dreamscapes'

I got nothing in particular to say this week, except check out my profile for a link to a song that I think fits this story rather nicely, so, without further ado... DISCLAIMER!

I do not own _Good Omens_. I'm just kicking over the sandcastles in Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman's sandbox. Don't you worry, I'll put them back when I'm done.

* * *

Somewhere out there in the world, there is a young boy who has the most vivid dreams of almost anyone in the world. He dreams of a dark-haired young man in sunglasses, with a wicked smile and a mischievous streak as big as the universe itself, and of fighting against something greater than his young mind can comprehend. When he closes his eyes, he can fly.

Somewhere out there in the world, there is another young boy who dreams with great intensity. His dreams are filled with mischief and demons, and a blue-eyed, bookish man who drinks tea and dresses in tartan and tweed. When he closes his eyes, it feels as if the whole world is his to play with, and it feels as if the whole world is out to get him. But he doesn't care, not so long as there is a pair of pale arms to wrap around his shoulders and a feeling of love that washes over him and excludes everything else.

The two boys dream, their fantasies twisting and curling together. Neither of them realises yet the meaning behind their dreams. Neither of them realises that, if they paid attention, their dreams would lead them to each other.

But, one night, years later when the boys have become men, their dreams are filled not with happiness, but with pain. One wakes screaming as he lives the pain of his soul being dissolved, one wakes crying as he is swallowed by never-ending darkness.

Pay attention. This is important.

* * *

-grins- Whatsamatter? Disappointed by the shortness?

Don't worry, next week's chapter, _Somnia e Caelis_ is longer.

See ya next week, peeps. =P


	3. Somnia e Caelis

Well... here it is, Chapter 3 - _Somnia e Caelis_ (Dreams from Heaven), and this is where the plot really gets going.

I don't own _Good Omens, _or Aziraphale and Crowley. The characters Ciar Vaughn and Lily Hill, however, do belong to me.

* * *

_He pushed past the man blocking his path – stupid, inconsequential humans, getting in his way – and darted towards the door. He burst through, shouting his friend's name. The heat hit him and for a second it felt like he'd run into a wall. He gasped, shook his head, ploughed on into the smoke, shouting again. "You – you stupid -" There was still no answer, and the fear shot through him again, as if someone had stabbed him in the stomach – not a pleasant experience, and he should know. It had happened more than a few times in his lifetime, though thankfully not recently – "Are you here?" He listened for any indication of his friend's whereabouts. Nothing. Just the crackle of burning paper, the splintering of glass as the fire reached the upstairs rooms, the crash of collapsing timbers. He scanned the shop urgently, desperately looking for any sign of his friend, of help._

_A bookshelf toppled over with a crash, the contents crumbling into smouldering ash. His trouser leg caught fire as he took a step and he glared at it to make it stop, ignoring the fire as he ventured deeper, yelling his friend's name again. "For Go-, for Sa-, for Somebody's sake!" he shrieked, and spun as the window smashed behind him._

_A jet of water struck him in the chest, sending him flying, his sunglasses bouncing off into a corner of the room and melting into an acrid puddle. Ash coated his trouser legs, the water that soaked him coming off in steam as it evaporated in the heat. He swiped at his face and his hand came away blackened. _

_The shop crumbled around him._

_And he cursed. He cursed the angel, the "Great" Ineffable Bloody Plan, and everything Above, Below, and In Between._

* * *

Ciar jerked awake with a gasp, and sat up, one hand reaching up to tangle into his dark hair. His eyes took in the familiar room and he sighed, burying his face in his hands. Just a dream… Just another dream…

He swung his legs out of bed and made his way to the bathroom, musing. The dreams had always been just a fact of life for him, something that he couldn't remember not having. He squeezed some toothpaste onto his toothbrush and began to scrub at his teeth.

And yet… No one else that he knew had dreams that were so real, so vivid… No one else remembered every single moment of their dreams as clearly as they had been while they were still asleep. No one else had dreams that seemed to last for years. No one else had dreams that followed on from each other, night after night, until they felt like a second life.

No one else woke up every morning and had to feel the pain of having to realise, over and over, that it wasn't real, that it was all in their head.

He spat the toothpaste into the sink, rinsed out his mouth and the toothbrush, depositing it into the cup he kept it in, and bared his teeth in the mirror in a fake grin that only showed off his unusually sharp canines. He turned away.

He could remember being seven years old and delightedly telling his mother all about a dream he'd had in which he'd been a snake. She'd only laughed, called him adorable, but as the dreams went on she'd become afraid when he kept describing them and had sent him to a psychiatrist. He hadn't known, at the time, what he was describing. He hadn't known that some of the things he'd been telling her were things that no seven-year-old should know.

He dragged a comb through his hair, sprayed deodorant – he'd shower in the evening, there was no time this morning – and left the bathroom.

Seven-year-old Ciar had been a quick learner. He'd quickly realised that his dreams scared people and started pretending that they'd stopped. The psychiatrist decided that there was nothing to worry about and he was sent on his way. But the dreams still came.

He pulled on black trousers, a white shirt, which he left untucked, knotted a black tie loosely around his neck, shrugged on a black jacket and grabbed his shoes.

It was time to head for his job interview.

He'd mentioned his dreams to only a few others since then, mostly in his university years, usually while drunk. Most of them had thought him crazy. A few people had described their own recurring dreams to him, but none of those dreams had been as vivid as his, none of those people had become so engrossed in their dreams that they'd felt _real_, none of them had dreams that changed every single night and yet stayed the same.

He paused at the bottom of the stairs, decided that he had time for breakfast, and grabbed a bowl of cereal.

One girl had been captivated by his description of what it felt like to fly. He'd had a relationship with her that had lasted a few months, and in that time he'd admitted how painful it was to wake up every day, thinking you were someone else, and then realise that it was all imaginary, and confessed to her what he'd never told anyone else. There was one person in his dreams that was constant. An angel with blonde hair and blue eyes, who dressed in tartan and tweed, loved books and silver Regency snuffboxes and was, when you got right down to it, disturbingly wrathful for an angel. She'd noticed the change in his whole demeanour when he described his angel (Ciar himself hadn't), smiled, and told him about a dream she'd had once in which she'd met the girl of her dreams (Lily – that was her name – was bisexual). It had seemed to last for months, she'd told him, and when she woke up she'd cried and tried to go back to sleep, but she hadn't been able to. In time, she told him in a quiet voice, she'd gotten over it.

He tossed the empty bowl in the sink, stopped at the door to grab his sunglasses – it was the middle of summer and very bright out – and as he slid them onto his nose and slammed the door shut behind him, he realised the most important difference between him and all the others he'd ever talked to about dreams.

None of them were completely, utterly, irrevocably in love with a figment of their own imaginations.

* * *

And here, have something extra:

http:/ serene-moonlight .deviantart .com/#/d3di841

I was bored. =P

See ya next week with Chapter 4, _Domum Reditus_, peeps.


	4. Domum Reditus

Domum Reditus - 'A/The Return Home'

Yeah, once again I have nothing in particular to say. Enjoy, I guess.

Don't own it, etc.

* * *

_He came slowly back to consciousness. He was warm, somewhere comfortable but not as comfortable as his bed, and there was something, somewhere between soft and hard, underneath his head. His eyelids fluttered, opened, and he lifted his head and took stock of where he was: on the sofa in the back room of the bookshop, using his numb arm, sunglasses clutched in his hand, as a pillow, and covered by – he squinted – a tartan blanket. His lips twitched. That was just like the angel. He put his head back down to go back to sleep. He hadn't been told to leave and judging by the light levels it was the middle of the night, so he didn't feel particularly inclined to go anywhere just yet, especially since he was warm and comfortable. _

_The bookshop was very quiet; the only sound was the muffled noise of the traffic outside. He listened absently, expecting to hear the sound of turning pages, and was surprised to hear deep, even breathing instead. He sat up, twisted to look towards the armchair that the angel usually read in at night, and was surprised to see his friend fast asleep, curled up in a ball on the chair with his finger stuck inside a book. He grinned. "'I never sleep,' indeed," he muttered, and slid silently off of the sofa and over to his drinking companion, carefully removing the book and slipping a bookmark inside before placing it on the little table._

_He turned to scrutinise the angel's sleeping face. It was strange… When he was awake, you could sometimes forget that he _was_ an angel. He certainly didn't act very angelic at times. Setting policemen's notebooks on fire and being deliberately rude to customers because he didn't want to sell any of his books definitely wasn't proper angelic behaviour. But… asleep, there was a strange, peaceful, almost ethereal quality to his face and all of a sudden it was impossible to believe that he was anything else._

_He shook his head to rid himself of the thought and turned away, pausing to blow out the candle, and then – as an afterthought – he miracled up a black blanket and covered the angel with it before heading back to the sofa._

_As he settled down, a familiar and yet strange noise started up, close by and yet far away, and everything faded around him._

* * *

Ciar surfaced into the bleary haze of one who isn't quite hungover, but definitely wasn't quite sober last night. He squinted at his clock… which wasn't there. Glancing around, he realised why. He'd fallen asleep on the sofa. He sat up carefully, ran a hand over his face.

Something had woken him. It was nagging at him now, calling for his attention… A noise…

_Ring ring… Ring ring…_

Phone!

He lurched to his feet and grabbed the phone off of the stand. "'Lo?" he croaked, swallowed, tried again. "Hello?"

"Ah, is that… um… See-ar Vaughn?" asked the woman on the other end.

"It's pronounced Keer, but yes, that's me. Who is this?"

"Fiona Bence."

"I don't know a Fiona Bence."

"I'm Mr Lloyd's secretary."

Ciar furrowed his brow. Lloyd… Lloyd… Oh! Yes. That was the boss of that banking company he'd gone to a job interview with a month or so ago. "Now I remember… Is this about the job? Does he want a second interview?"

"Actually, you've _got_ the job."

"Oh. Oh, excellent. When do you want me to start?"

"Any time between tomorrow and this time next week. We're willing to be flexible because Mr Lloyd remembered that you said you were looking for a flat in London?"

"Yes, I'm going to look at one today… Adam's Row." He peered at his watch. "In about an hour, actually…"

"I'll let you go, then. Glad to have you on board, Mr Vaughn."

"Glad to be on board," he responded absently, hanging up. He stood silently for a moment, staring at the phone, before he tossed it aside. "Shower, coffee," he muttered to himself, and headed for the bathroom.

* * *

Ciar jumped off of the train, cursing under his breath. He was going to be late. He _hated_ being late… Unless it was deliberate, and it definitely wasn't in this case.

He wound his way through the crowd with practised ease, somehow managing to look casual and hurry at the same time, and stepped out into the street, glancing around to get his bearings and remember the directions he had been given before darting off in the right direction, pausing only to call a hurried "Sorry!" over his shoulder as he jostled a blonde man about his own age.

He arrived at his destination roughly fifteen minutes later, slightly out of breath, and skidded to a stop. "Sorry I'm late," he told the agent. "Train was delayed."

"Don't worry, that happens all the time. That or people get lost," the agent responded. He pulled the keys out of his pocket. "Shall we?"

Ciar nodded, and followed the agent up to the flat to look around. It was clean and surprisingly spacious.

"So, do you like it?" asked the agent when they were done. Ciar considered. The flat felt… somehow right. He nodded slowly. "Yeah… I like it. How much is the deposit?"

It was expensive, but he'd known that it would be. It was fine. He had the money saved up, mostly the birthday money from his parents and his grandmother this year.

Although… He grimaced. He wouldn't have much money to live on for the rest of the month. He hadn't saved a great deal, since he hadn't been expecting to lose his old job. Still, the new job would pay better than his old one had.

Taking the offered pen, he signed the lease and tried to suppress a strange feeling that something had just fallen into place.


	5. Somnia ex Infernis

Title, as I'm sure you've guessed from Chapter 3's title, means "Dreams from Hell"

Alrighty. You've met Ciar Vaughn, Crowley's reincarnation, and now you finally get to meet Aziraphale's. I hope you like him as much as I do.

Also, for the sake of avoiding any nastiness, this is not my belief about Americans. It is simply what I believed that Aziraphale would be likely to think. Are we clear on this? No flames? Good.

I don't own Good Omens even a little bit.

* * *

_He had to admit that he wasn't really surprised that the Antichrist had been given to an American couple. Most powerful country in the world, and all that._

_He'd never really liked Americans. They were too coarse, completely unrefined. They dropped letters out of words and pronounced things strangely and, well, even _he_ had to admit that sometimes they took religion just a little bit too far. This _was_ the 20__th__ century, after all, and not the 13__th__. Just because someone thought differently to you was no reason to treat them horribly. It was more important to love thy neighbour – and thine enemy – and, besides, it was the strength of their faith and whether they did good things that was important, not _where_ their faith was placed._

_Er. Right? He frowned, and then shook his head. Oh dear. He was _far_ too sober to be trying to pick the nature of the world apart._

_He eyed his dark-haired companion, who was lounging with one arm hanging over the top of the tour bus. By all rights, the demon should have moved to America long ago. It was the greatest power in the world, now. That was why they'd originally settled in England, after all, back when it still had the empire. They'd just never really gotten around to leaving. In his case, it was because he rather _liked_ England, if he was honest. He just wasn't quite sure why his counterpart was reluctant to leave as well. _

_Not that he wasn't pleased, of course. If the demon left England, he'd have to follow. He _was_ supposed to be Thwarting him, after all, Arrangement or no Arrangement. _

_His companion sighed, distracting him from his thoughts, and pulled out a notebook. "Alright. What've you got?"_

_He beamed, pulling out his own notebook. "Francis seems to be doing rather well. The dear boy seems to be rather fond of the insects in the garden"_

"_He likes to squash them with slippers," interjected the demon._

_The angel shifted uncomfortably. "Yes, well… What have you got?"_

"_He's afraid of the dog"_

"_Er. What dog? Oh! You mean your nanny's flea-bitten hellho- I mean, delightful little pup?"_

_The demon rolled his eyes – or, at least, the angel assumed that he did. It was difficult to tell behind his sunglasses, but there was something about the way his eyebrows moved. "You don't have to pretend around me, angel. I know you hate the thing."_

"_I don't _hate_ it…" He caught the demon's look, and flushed. "Alright, fine, I hate it. Happy?"_

"_Not in the least," responded his companion gloomily, shifting slightly in his seat. He didn't look quite… comfortable. _

"_My dear, there's something bothering you. What is it?"_

"_What makes you think there's anything bothering me?" The demon wouldn't quite meet his eyes._

_The angel sighed. "I've known you for six millennia now. I might be an angel, but that doesn't mean I'm _foolish_. What is it?"_

_The demon hesitated for a moment, staring out over the city, and then turned to the angel and did something that surprised him. He took off his sunglasses, and met the angel's blue eyes._

"_Angel… Are we doing the right thing here?" He held up a hand. "I don't mean Right. I don't want to hear about Wrong or Right, or the Great Plan, or any of that… I just…" He looked down. "Is this really going to help?"_

_The angel swallowed, looking away for a moment, and then reached out and put a gentle hand on his companion's shoulder. _

"…_I don't know."_

* * *

Alex sighed and sat up, trying to shake off the feeling of being pierced by those familiar golden eyes, their clarity dulled slightly by worry and confusion, but no less beautiful – nay, more beautiful for it, for it was times like those, times when he saw that demon's vulnerable side…

He sighed again, shook his head, and brushed through his hair with one hand.

Same old, same old… The dreams were a part of life for him, always had been. They were like a second existence - a far more interesting second existence than his real one, and a heartbreaking one as well. He couldn't count the times that he'd wept for the angel's inability to save a life or a soul, for his guilt, his confusion, or his regret over a stupid argument with his only friend.

He groaned, resting his forehead on the back of his hand. It was confusing, too. He woke up every morning with the memories of the falls and triumphs of an angel fresh in his mind, with the memory of an unnecessary heart quickening in his chest at a glance from impossible, golden, serpentine eyes…

Every single morning he woke with the confusion and mental anguish of an angel in love with a demon fresh in his mind - a terrible, unforgivable, forbidden love, surely something that he would be punished for. In his dreams, he worried constantly about being found out, whether it be from Above or by his – _the_ – demon himself. Either way, he would surely lose his only friend.

There he was, again… Thinking about the dreams as if they were real, thinking about the angel and the demon as if they were real. Was he crazy? He certainly felt crazy.

He shook his head desperately in an attempt to clear his mind, to push the dream into the furthest, darkest corner of his brain, and then got up and headed for the shower, taking his clothes with him.

He'd often wondered, as a teenager, why he had these dreams and no one else did. One friend of his – a Buddhist – had suggested that he really had been reincarnated and that he was remembering his old life (or lives) in his dreams, and he'd scoffed. He'd never described the dreams to her in any real detail, but he was fairly certain that angels didn't die _or _get reincarnated. He hadn't dared to describe the demon to her.

He'd accepted it now, that he was different, but the dreams still bothered him. They were too real and he remembered them too clearly. Normal people forgot their dreams.

He sighed as he dried off his hair and pulled on his clothes. Obsessing about it wasn't going to get him anywhere. He needed to get to work.

He paused to grab some breakfast and the remains of a bag of bread from the fridge. At lunch time, he'd feed the ducks in St James's Park, like he did every Wednesday.

He left the library just before noon and set off towards St James's. The journey was uneventful, except for when a flustered young man almost ran into him near the train station, pausing only to call an apology over his shoulder and hurry off again. Alex smiled slightly. At least he'd said sorry. He'd been run into by plenty of people who hadn't bothered before now. Just one of the 'perks' of living in London, he supposed.

He tossed a piece of bread at the quacking ducks, trying not to think too hard about why he chose St James's. Hyde Park was closer to his home, so it would have made more sense for him to go there, but…

He might as well face it, he thought with a quiet sigh. He came to St James's because it was where he fed ducks in his dreams. It felt somehow _right_ to do it in his waking life as well, although he always felt lonely. It wasn't that he didn't have any friends, it was just that none of them really wanted to walk so far just to feed ducks, and he wouldn't have asked them to do it anyway. It was something that he felt belonged to the friend from his dreams.

…Which was stupid, because that friend didn't exist (he determinedly ignored the way that his heart sank at the thought), but… the dreams had always felt so real. So real, in fact, that he'd sometimes find himself wondering what the demon would say in a certain situation, what he'd do. It had gotten him in trouble more than once for laughing in serious situations.

He shook his head. There he went again, thinking about it… What good would that do? Perhaps it was time to visit the bookshop again, get something to keep him occupied.

He threw the last piece of bread and crumpled up the bag, tossing it in the bin as he passed. He'd grab a sandwich and some tea at a café before heading back to work…

Yet he couldn't help but glance behind him, almost as if he was expecting to see a dark-haired man in sunglasses watching him go.

He wasn't there. He never was.

* * *

Isn't he lovely? =P

Reviews adored, but not compulsory.

See you next week.

Dawny, signing off~


	6. Amantes Ignorantes

"Unknowing Lovers". I'm sure you'll understand why.

...I honestly cannot think of anything interesting or witty to say this week. It's been a long couple of days. Don't worry, I'm fine, just haven't been sleeping well.

Onto the disclaimer:

I do not own or claim to own _Good Omens_. It belongs to Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, who are geniuses of a caliber that I could not hope to reach. I am not profiting from this story.

* * *

_The heat was intense, hotter even than the blazing bookshop had been. His concentration faltered for a moment as he remembered that he hadn't been able to find the angel. The Bentley shivered as if it would fall apart. He shook his head, forcing himself to concentrate and keep the car on track._

_The angel was fine. Of course he was fine. At worst, he'd been discorporated. Of course… that would be a problem. It meant that he would have to stop the Apocalypse on his own._

_He forced all thoughts that didn't pertain to keeping the Bentley moving out of his head. He couldn't afford to be distracted. Not now, when his concentration was the only thing between him and a nasty discorporation... and the end of the world. _

_It wasn't long before his knuckles turned white. He was gripping the steering wheel so hard that it hurt. The Bentley's condition was getting worse and worse. It was difficult to keep it moving. It had been far too long since he'd had to do anything that required this level of concentration, and on top of that his body was protesting vigorously at the lack of air and it was taking up far too much of his concentration to remember not to start breathing. That wouldn't be very smart. He'd probably pass out before he had the time to purge the toxins from his system, and then it would definitely all be over. Stupid! He didn't even _need_ to breathe. It was just… habit._

_The Bentley jarred, and for one unnecessary-heart-stopping moment, he thought it was going to fall apart, before he managed to get it running smoothly again. He gritted his teeth with the strain, and forced himself to think of only his goal. He couldn't worry about anything else right now._

_And so, trailing a cloud of smoke, he blazed his way – literally – down the M25, and a stray thought in the back of his mind regretfully reminded him that the motorway was all his fault anyway. Stupid. It should have been his greatest achievement, but… it was so _pointless_._

_It would be gone soon, anyway, if he failed._

_He _couldn't_ fail. Not now._

_He _wouldn't_ fail._

* * *

Ciar jerked awake with a gasp, jolting upright and taking deep, shuddering breaths like a drowning man who had found air. He pressed a hand against his chest, feeling his pounding heart, and swallowed hard, feeling strangely exhausted.

A dream. Just a dream. Just a dream. He repeated it like a mantra until he'd calmed down, and then let out his breath in a rush. Normality, that's what he needed. Normality, and something to distract himself with.

Shower, coffee, and then explore the area around his new home. That was what he'd do. He needed to acquaint himself with the area anyway.

Plan made, he headed for the bathroom.

* * *

An hour later he found himself, somewhat confused, in the district of Soho with only a vague idea of how he'd got there. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and slouched on the street corner, looking around. He wasn't worried, he'd find his way back easily enough – he always had before – it was just…

He _knew_ this place. He'd visited it thousands of times in his dreams. How was it possible that he'd managed to perfectly recreate a real place that he'd never visited?

He shook his head. Crazy. They were right, he really was crazy. Strangely, he couldn't bring himself to care. Maybe he'd come to terms with the fact that he was insane a long time ago. He twitched his sunglasses up his nose, suddenly possessed with the desire to know if the bookshop was a real place too. It was stupid, he knew that. If it wasn't a real place, he'd be disappointed, and if it was…

If it was…

…he'd be disappointed that the angel wasn't there.

He shook his head, scowling. "Stupid," he muttered to himself, but spun on his heel and headed off in the direction of the shop anyway, tracing streets that he knew like the back of his hand, following a path that he'd walked a thousand times before. His steps slowed as he reached the right street, and stopped completely as he reached the building that he knew was the bookshop.

It was an ordinary bookshop. It looked different, and yet the same. He bit his lip. He should just turn around and leave. Going in there wouldn't help anything. He was obsessing over a stupid dream, something that wasn't real and never would be… But his hand lifted and he pushed the door open, stepping over the threshold and onto a familiar wooden floor.

Alex lifted his head as the bell over the door rang. It was a familiar sound. He'd heard it all his life, first in his dreams and then in reality. He'd been surprised, to say the least, to learn that there really _was_ a bookshop in the same place as the one that the alter ego in his dreams owned. He'd been frequenting it ever since, something always drawing him back. The young woman who owned the shop knew him well, now.

Now, he was also surprised to find that someone else was there. It wasn't a particularly busy shop at the best of times, only on special occasions like when the next in a popular series of books was released.

After a moment, he looked away, back to the book he'd been examining. He scanned a couple of pages, and then set it aside, going back to wandering between the stacks.

He came out into the main part of the room and his eyes fell on the opposite side of one of the tables stacked with books. He moved forwards, his eye caught by the cover of a book, and reached out to pick it up, only to find his hand bumping into someone else's fingers. He hurriedly drew back. "Sorry." He half looked up, not quite looking at the stranger, who made a hurried gesture with one hand. "No, it's fine, you have it…"

His voice was familiar, but Alex couldn't quite put his finger on it. He looked up, but the stranger had turned away before he could get a good look at him.

Ciar turned away from the young man, flustered. He'd looked _almost_ like… Younger, admittedly, but almost like… But he couldn't be.

He shook his head, and settled his eyes on the shelves. Well, he was in a bookstore, so he might as well look for a book to buy. He ran his gaze almost absent-mindedly over the spines, looking for something to catch his eye, and then frowned as he remembered something. Lily had always been recommending a book to him. Apparently it was really old, but he had a feeling that if any place had a copy of it, then it would be a little bookshop like this. Either way, it wouldn't hurt to ask.

He moved over to the counter, where the shop owner was quietly reading. She was a young woman, blonde, wearing glasses. "Excuse me?" he said.

She looked up. "Good afternoon, sir. Are you looking for something?"

He nodded. "Yes, uh… A book a friend recommended to me. I think it's called _Angels and Demons_?"

She considered this for a moment. "Dan Brown?"

Good point... He didn't remember. It had been something like that, though.

He nodded. "Yeah."

She smiled. "You're in luck."

"You have a copy?"

She shook her head. "Not right now, but we have a few on order. The delivery should be coming late next Tuesday. I'll put one aside for you and you can drop by on Wednesday, or whenever you have time, if you'd like?"

"Sure."

"Consider it done, sir. Anything else?"

He shook his head. "No, that's it. I'll see you next week, then."

"Goodbye," she called after him, and he absently waved a hand over his shoulder. "Yeah, bye…"

The door shut behind him with a tinkle and he slid his sunglasses back on, before looking around in slight confusion.

_Now to figure out how to get home…_

* * *

There is no meaning or symbolism behind the book that Ciar is searching for beyond the fact that I like that book and couldn't resist the title.

See you all same time and place next week.


	7. Lacrimae Angelae

I would like to apologise profusely for the lateness of this chapter. I was unfortunately without internet last night due to sleeping at a friend's house. Usually this wouldn't have been a problem as I did actually have my laptop with me, but for some reason we couldn't spell her wireless passkey correctly and so I was unable to update. I apologise for my lack of foresight.

"Tears of an Angel" (feminine form of angel)

I do not own _Good Omens_

* * *

_Lailahel…_

She glanced up from where she'd been reading. "Gabriel?"

And there he was, sitting on the edge of the desk on the other side of her room, grinning at her, his wings glowing faintly. "How goes your task, little sister?"

Lailahel sighed and set her book aside, concentrating for a moment in order to shake out her own wings, her short blonde hair growing long and darkening to black as she did so. "The same. They are as dense as ever they were, I'm afraid. The both of them were in the shop at the same time just last week. I know they saw each other, and yet they did not recognise each other." She shook her head ruefully. "Hopefully it won't take them two thousand years this time. They don't have that kind of time to waste."

He examined her face for a moment, and then sighed as well. "It still pains you that you were forced to discontinue your friendship with the dark one, does it not?"

"Ciar," she corrected him, and then looked away. "It does. I understand why I was considered to be out of line in allowing myself to form a relationship with him, but I do not regret anything that happened. He needed a friend, someone who understood him, and I was there to take over that role."

"I'm sorry," he said softly. "If it had been down to me, you would have been allowed to continue your friendship with him, but you must understand that the others do not understand humans as well as you and I. They feared that by allowing you to continue a… _romantic_ relationship with him, they risked having him fall in love with you."

Lailahel snorted. "Oh, really… He's completely besotted with Azi- with Alex. I assure you, I was no threat. Besides… it wasn't really romantic, per se. It was two close friends allowing each other some privileges."

"_That_, I am afraid, is something that I do not understand."

"I wouldn't expect you to," she admitted.

"You care for them." It wasn't a question, but a statement.

Lailahel looked downcast. "I do."

"You take this task so much more seriously than any of us had expected. The Voice has expressed a concern over this."

She looked down at her hands, clasped in her lap, and said nothing.

He sighed again, his wings rustling as he shifted position. "Is it because of what happened twenty-six years ago to this day?"

She was shaking slightly as she responded. "I can't forget it, brother. I can't forget what it felt like to be holding that sword when it ran him through. It doesn't matter that he was already dead inside, trapped inside a world of darkness, that he felt nothing and saw nothing… I can't forget what it was like to see that final spark of life kindle in those dead eyes, to see the grey turn momentarily to blue once again before it faded into nothing and he was gone. I c-can't. It wasn't… It wasn't fair… Don't… D-don't ask me to forget." Her voice trembled more and more until the final words were thick and almost unintelligible, her eyes filling with tears.

Gabriel stood and took a step towards her, wrapping her in his arms while she sobbed uncontrollably. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you had to be the one to do that. You're right. It wasn't fair. But you can't beat yourself up over it. It was a part of the Plan. It had to be done… And don't forget that he was brought back. Things can be fixed now."

She nodded, sniffing and wiping at her eyes, before she jerked back suddenly, away from him, as the shop bell jingled. "Customer!" she hissed, and all at once her wings were gone and her disguise was back in place. She headed for the door to the front room, and then paused, looking back at Gabriel. He nodded. "I'll remain here."

She slipped through into the front room, just in time to see Ciar. "Good…" she checked the clock, "…afternoon, sir."

"Hi," he responded absently, his mind obviously elsewhere. His sunglasses were tucked into the breast pocket of his shirt and his amber eyes were fixed on one of the bookshelves. "Are you looking for something in particular?" she asked him, intending to sound businesslike, but she slipped and it came out sounding playful. She winced. That had been the tone of voice she'd used back in university right before… _ahem_. Hopefully he hadn't noticed.

But his head had whipped round in surprise.

_Bugger_.

—

He stepped into the shop, smiling slightly at the familiar jingle of the bell, and slid his sunglasses off, tucking them into his pocket, before making his way towards one of the shelves. He vaguely noticed the shop owner make her way over and greet him. He returned the greeting automatically, his eyes wandering over the books in search of the one he wanted.

"Are you looking for something in particular?"

Her voice cut suddenly through his thoughts, and his head jerked up. He knew that voice. He knew that tone of voice.

But… It couldn't be… She'd moved to Australia. He turned, his eyes searching the young woman's face. The hair was too short, too light. Her hair had been long, down to the small of her back, and ebony black, and this woman's was blonde and cropped around her face. She wore glasses, too, and there was something different about her face, but if he looked – really _looked_ – it was her…

"_Lily_?" he asked in shock, and her eyes widened.

"…Crow," she said reluctantly, after a moment.

"I thought you'd moved to Australia."

Her eyes dropped to the ground. "I'm sorry. It wasn't meant to be like this. You weren't supposed to know, you weren't supposed to recognise me!" She sounded almost desperate, and she was biting her lip in the way that he remembered.

And then her head jerked up and her hands twisted into the hair at her temples, exactly as she'd always done when she was distressed. "Aw, no! Oh, shit, Gabriel is gonna be _steamed_!" she groaned.

"Why am I going to be angry?" asked a voice from behind her, and she turned quickly. Ciar followed her gaze to the young man – a few years older than him, from his looks – with curly blonde hair and dark brown eyes, who was leaning against the doorframe.

Lily flinched. "I'm sorry… I didn't think…" She looked pleadingly at the newcomer, as if asking him what to do. He closed his eyes for a moment, and then opened them again and fixed her with a direct look. "Do whatever you feel to be right," he said. "If anyone gives you trouble, I will tell them that you acted on my orders… but I can't help you any more than that. From now until your task is over, you're on your own."

Lily nodded and turned back to Ciar, looking miserable as her friend – Gabriel – left.

"I think you'd better come through to the back," she said with a sigh. "It's going to be a long story..."

—

She set a cup of coffee down on the table in front of him and slid into the seat opposite, blowing on her steaming cup of tea. "I can't tell you everything," she warned. "I have orders, and much though I would like to I can't disobey them. Thanks to Gabriel I have a little more leeway now than I would have otherwise had, but there are still things that I cannot say." She took a sip of tea, and sighed, pressing her fingers against the bridge of her nose, and then waved one elegant hand in his direction. "Ask. Anything you wish to know, ask it, and if it is within my power to do so, I shall answer you."

He swallowed hard, staring into his drink, and then, "Your name isn't really Lily, is it?"

"No."

"What is it?"

She considered. "It's a bit hard to render in English – you, of all people, should know what that's like. The closest rendering would, I think, be Lailahel, but Leliel is also used, along with several other variations... However, I think the Angel of Night uses Leliel as the official version of his name now."

"Then you're an angel? Why are you here? Why -"

"One question at a time," she implored him. "Yes, I'm an angel. My official job is to guard the spirits at their birth. As for why I'm here..." she hesitated, sighed. "I can't tell you. All I can say is that I'm rather like your Guardian Angel, but I cannot say why."

He took an overly-large gulp of the coffee, and half-choked on it, coughing. "The... The dreams?" he asked, as soon as he could breathe again.

Lailahel nodded. "Real," she assured him. "Memories. And, yes, before you ask... They _are_ my doing. To some extent, at least. They would have gotten through to you without my help, but they would have been muddled and confused and you would have taken them to be just that – dreams. I merely nudged your soul a little to set things in motion."

"_Why?_" he demanded. "Why should I have to live feeling like some kind of _freak_? Is this your idea of a sick joke? The way that _He_ gets his kicks?" The tone of his voice left no doubt as to who he was referring to.

Lailahel shook her head desperately, biting her lip. "No! No, it's not a joke. Our Father was only looking out for you -"

"Why would He do that?" snapped Ciar. "I was one of the Fallen, remember? Why should _He_ care about me?"

Lailahel stared down at a knot in the wood of the table. "You were His favourites, you know..." she whispered after a moment. "The angels with free will... Such a thing should have been impossible, and yet, there you were..."

Ciar was lost for words for a moment, before it sunk in that she was using plurals. He jumped up, slammed his hands into the tabletop. "Is _he_ here too?" he demanded. Lailahel pressed a hand to her cheek, one canine tooth digging into her lip. "I cannot say..."

He kept his eyes trained on her, but she didn't look at him and after a moment he sat back down again, feeling suddenly weary. "Why?"

"You'll have to be more specific."

"Why are you here?"

"I can't say."

"Of course," he muttered in annoyance. "Why did you pretend to be my friend?"

She looked up in shock, her eyes filling suddenly with tears. "I wasn't pretending. I swear. If you believe nothing else that I say today, please, believe this. I really was your friend. You needed someone. I knew that." She hesitated for a moment, seeing that he was glowering into the cup she had placed in front of him, and then plunged on. "Technically, I was disobeying orders. They had told me not to reveal myself to you, but I thought that if I pretended to be a human, I wouldn't be giving myself away. It was alright for a while, but... they thought it was too dangerous for me to continue to be friends with you. They thought that it would endanger my mission, so they ordered me to cut all ties to you. That's why I made up that story about moving to Australia. I'm not like you were. I can't disobey a direct order... so I've been working quietly in the background, influencing things around you, ever since then..."

The shop bell tinkled.

He stood up and put on his sunglasses. Lailahel felt her heart sink. The sunglasses were, and always had been, a barrier between him and the outside world. He glanced down at her, and for a moment it looked as if he was going to say something, but then he turned and walked away. She hung her head.

"Samantha?" called a confused voice from the front room. "Are you here?"

She swallowed, wiping away her tears. "Coming, Alex!" she called, and followed Ciar through to the front of the shop in time to see the door swing shut behind him. Alex glanced after him. "Who was that?"

Lailahel sighed. "An old friend... or, rather, someone who _was_ my friend, once... but I'm afraid that he rather feels like I betrayed him."

Alex frowned. "Really? That seems rather unfair, and not at all like you."

Lailahel smiled weakly. "Thanks, Alex, but... unfortunately... I think he's right."

* * *

=P Not what you were hoping for? Sorry, but this chapter was somehow neccessary.

Don't worry, we'll be back to the usual next week.


	8. Bonae Aves

Another week, another chapter. =P

Title literally translates to 'Good Birds', but with the knowledge that the Romans used augery to predict the future, it can also be taken to mean 'Good Omens'. I'm going with the latter.

And on an unrelated note, I just started watching _My Little Pony - Friendship is Magic_, which, frankly, is so cute it makes me want to cry.

DISCLAIMER: Yeah. Still don't own it.

* * *

_At some point in the evening, they'd relocated from the Ritz to the back room of his shop. He wasn't quite sure how they'd gotten there, which should have worried him, but it didn't, for one very simple reason: They were drunk. They had every right to be. They'd just stopped the Apocalypse (well, okay, it had mostly been Adam, but still, they'd _helped). _The only problem was, he wasn't sure how drunk they were. They were way past 'fuzzy', but hadn't yet hit the depression stage. Certainly, the bottle of wine had been emptied several times over. He tried to count how many times on his fingers and muddled it up after three. _

_He gave up trying to work it out. He didn't really care, if he was honest. Right now, he was too busy trying to come up with a counterargument to his drinking companion's excellently-phrased point. _

"_Nah, nah… 'S like…" He waved his wineglass, the red liquid coming dangerously close to slopping out and staining the white tablecloth. "'S like… 'S like a nightingale."_

"_What?"_

"_Y'know… Li'l brown bird. Sings pretty."_

_The demon appeared to consider this for a moment. "…What?" he repeated._

_The angel frowned. Good point. What _was_ his point? "Sings real pretty, but 't's really plain-lookin'," he managed after a moment. "Ssso… people d'n't realise it's all spec- spesh- shpeshul. 'S like… us. M'kind, I mean. Angels. All plain-actin', makin' people do good shtuff wi'out realisin' iz us… an' an' an' no one notices us."_

_Silence. "…You're pretty," put in the demon after a moment. "Pretty-pretty whiiite feath'rs. Not brown."_

_A small part of the angel, the part that was still just about sober, realised that the demon would probably have quite happily drunk holy water at the realisation of what he'd just said, if it hadn't been for the fact that he was too drunk to really know what he was saying. The rest of him, like his companion, was too drunk to care._

"_But… y'r kind, dem'ns," he carried on, resolutely, "they'r m're like… like… bird-a-par'dize"_

"_Uh?"_

_He nodded, and wished that he hadn't. "Urgh…" he muttered, squeezing his eyes shut as the world spun around him. When it settled down, he opened them again and took another gulp of wine. "Y'r… flasshhhhy. Flashy b'st'ds" _

_The demon looked pleased. The angel continued anyway. "Y'make shhhhure that ev'ryone noti-notices you, 'cos' that's how y'work. L'k a'me, 'm amaaaaazin', an' an' an' y'could be like me too, 'f y'just lemme… lemme… y'know. Demon shtuff. Tem'ting. Wilin'. Shtuff. Lust, Deadly Sins, an' all th't lark."_

_His companion looked confused. "Wh't d'larks h've t'do withis?"_

_He was momentarily thrown. "Larks? Early birds. Sing inna mornin'. M'be they're in league wi'the nightin'ales."_

_They both contemplated this for a short while. "Guezz it d'z'n't m'tt'r, relly," muttered his companion moodily. "Th're out t' kill me an-any…way. Jus' like e'erythin' elze." The demon slumped over the edge of the table. _

_The angel frowned through the haze that was rapidly encroaching upon the last clear part of his mind, trying to work out what was wrong with that statement, and then, "'M not tryin' t'… t'kill you. Trust you."_

"_You shouldn'" muttered his friend darkly. "'M a demon. Can' trus' demons. Turn y'back and BAM! We steal yer… yer… yer…" He frowned, looking confused. "Wings right off yer feath'rs?" A pause. "No… Wait… Swap that… Feath'rs right 'ff yer wings."_

_There was silence for a moment while the other considered this piece of information. "Wouldn' want _my_ feath'rs," he said decisively. "They're a mess."_

"'_S not the point…"_

"_Then… what is?"_

_His friend shrugged. "Dunno. F'got." He swirled the red liquid around in his glass and then drank it, staring sourly into the middle distance before he folded his arms, laid his head on them and went straight to sleep._

_He raised an eyebrow at the sleeping demon, but said nothing, staring at his own unfinished glass of wine for a moment before shrugging and doing the same. He'd sober up in the morning, and worry about it then…_

_—  
_

Alex woke slowly and frowned as the drunken feeling from his dream took a moment to wear off. Ugh. Almost as bad as actually being drunk – except that, thankfully, he didn't have to deal with the hangover.

He glanced at the clock, shook his head, and pushed the dream to the back of his mind. He didn't have time to dwell on it this morning. There were more important things to worry about. Mind made up, he headed for the shower.

He dithered as the water warmed up, keeping his mind resolutely blank, but once he was in the shower there was no escaping it. Samantha was upset. Her friend – the dark-haired man that he'd seen leaving the shop – was angry with her, and Samantha was afraid that he had every right to be.

Maybe he couldn't _fix_ it, but after all the time they'd spent together in his – her – _the _bookshop, he considered her a friend, and he wasn't the type to let a friend be sad if there was anything at all that he could do about it. So he'd da- he'd _jolly well_ go and see her after work that afternoon and do everything in his power to cheer her up. The bookstore was always open late on Thursdays, anyway.

But first, he had to feed the ducks.

—

Ciar sat on the bench in St James's Park and scowled out over the lake, his lunch left mostly uneaten by his side. All of a sudden, he wasn't very hungry after all. He'd managed to keep his mind off of it up until now, but now that there was no more work to do, no distractions, he couldn't ignore it any longer. Lily had lied. Lily wasn't even Lily. She was an angel. Leliel or Lailahel, or something like that. And he… He wasn't Ciar. Or was he? He groaned. He wasn't sure.

He toyed with the sunglasses in his lap. So what _did _he know? His dreams were _real_, real memories of a previous life. He'd been an angel. And then, he'd Fallen. There was no point in beating around the bush about it. He hadn't intended to Fall, but he had, and for 6,000 years, he'd been a demon sent to Earth to damn the souls of humans. _The_ demon, in fact. The snake in the Garden, with the Forbidden Fruit? Him.

He'd been very good at the job. Sometimes he'd gotten a lot of satisfaction out of it. Other times… not so much.

He possibly hadn't been a very good demon, towards the end of it. Doing good things, thwarting the Apocalypse…

…Being friends (or was it more than friends?) with an _angel, _his counterpart, of all people. Yeah. He had definitely been in Hell's Bad Books (not that Hell had any other kind) by the end of his life.

…Which ultimately lead to the question of _What the Manchester was he doing here, anyway?_ He was human. He was sure of that much. Which meant that, at some point, he'd _died. _And then he'd come back. How? He'd been one of the Fallen, so surely _Up There_ hadn't given a da- hadn't cared all that much about him, and Down Below… Well, they'd hated him, and he wasn't sure that they even had the ability to reincarnate souls anyway (especially since, for a demon – or an angel, for that matter – death really was the end. Their souls scattered across the void, never to return).

Another thought hit him, and for a moment his heart almost stopped. If he was here… did that mean the angel was too? Had they _both_ died? Had the angel been right in all his nonsensical ramblings about the Great Plan and the nature of Ineffability? Was there _really_ something that the two of them were meant to do?

His mind spun, and hit on the blonde man in the shop the other day. His eyes widened. Of _course_! He'd brushed it off at the time. He looked younger, certainly – the angel had always looked a good decade older than him in his mortal corporations, though certainly well-preserved – but… it was him. Was it him? Surely it had to be…

…Or maybe he just wanted it to be him.

He groaned, and buried his face in his hands. He was going to drive himself absolutely crazy like this.

He sat up straight again, intending to go for a walk to try and calm himself down, and his eyes fell on a blonde man directly in front of him, tossing bread to the ducks. He was wearing a long beige coat – not quite tartan, but close enough to the angel's sense of fashion that it made his mouth go dry.

He bit his lip. It couldn't hurt, surely? Just to go and talk to him. There was no harm in that. If he was the angel… then he would have been having dreams too.

After a moment, Ciar nodded to himself and stood, grabbing the discarded sandwich. He wasn't going to eat it anyway.

—

Alex tossed another crust to the ducks, losing himself in thought. His mind wandered absently, lingering on various topics – tasks he had to do when he returned to work that afternoon, things he had to buy (apples, toilet paper, milk and tea, another loaf of bread…). He snapped back to reality suddenly as he noticed that a dark-haired young man about his age had come to a stop next to him, and was absently tossing pieces of buttered baguette to the ducks. He blinked. "Ah, hello."

The man grinned at him (there was something familiar about that grin, Alex thought vaguely), and tossed another piece of bread. "Hey."

"Have we… met? You seem familiar…" He paused as realisation came to him. "Oh, yes, that's right. You were in the bookstore the other day."

The man faltered slightly. "Yes," he said after a moment, tossing the last of his baguette.

"There aren't usually very many customers there, you see," explained Alex.

"I don't doubt it," his companion responded, and then hesitated for a moment before turning and sticking out a hand. "I'm Ciar, by the way."

Alex shifted his bag of bread to the other hand and shook. "Alex." He stared at their hands – his own pale, slightly pudgy fingers curled around a tan palm. Ciar's fingers were surprisingly elegant, he noted, before extracting himself from his grip. Something was niggling at the back of his brain.

He cast around for a topic of conversation. "Ah… Samantha seemed rather upset last time I was there. I don't suppose you were there when… whatever it was happened?"

Ciar frowned, confused, and then realisation dawned. "Oh, is that what she's calling herself these days?"

"…What?"

Ciar sighed, turning back to the ducks and nonchalantly helping himself to a piece of Alex's bread to throw to them. "I knew her when I was at university," he explained, "but she went by Lily back then."

"Oh." Alex looked down. "So, I guess you _were_ the friend that she was talking about…" A part of him was strangely upset at the news, and another part commented cynically that it wasn't the least bit surprised. He tried to ignore them both.

Ciar cocked an eyebrow. "What now?"

Alex tossed his last piece of bread. "I was in the shop last night, right after you left. She said that an old friend was angry at her and felt like she'd betrayed him, and that she was upset with herself because she felt like he was right." He balled up the empty bread packet.

Ciar looked down for a moment, and then back up again, staring out over the lake. "She was hiding things from me," he said shortly. "Things that she had no right to hide."

Alex opened his mouth, and then paused and closed it again. They stood in moody silence for a moment, before he spoke again. "If you don't mind my asking… Why did you come over and talk to me?"

Ciar dipped his head again, his dark hair obscuring his eyes. "…You reminded me of an old friend I used to feed these ducks with," he said finally. "I was… hoping that you _were_ him."

"Oh," said Alex, softly. "I'm sorry. I hope you find him."

Ciar laughed bitterly. "Yeah. Me too."

Alex hesitated. "I have to get back to work."

Ciar jammed his hands into his pockets. "Maybe I'll see you around, Blondie."

Alex opened his mouth to protest the nickname, but decided that it wasn't worth the bother and nodded instead. "Maybe. It was nice meeting you."

Ciar nodded, not looking at him. Alex watched him for a moment, before turning and walking away.

Something compelled him to pause and look back before the lake was out of sight, and he had to repress a strange urge to go back.

For the first time in his life, just like he'd always expected, a dark-haired man in sunglasses watched him walk away from St. James's Park.

* * *

We're nearing the end now... just one chapter and an epilogue to go.


	9. Tandem me Novisti

Soo... last chapter. Only the Epilogue remains.

Title this week translates to 'At Last You Know Me.' That's 'knowing' in the sense of 'having recognised'. I've also added translations of all the previous chapter titles to the pertinent chapter, so go and check those if you were wondering what the titles meant.

Two small points regarding this chapter.

1. Please don't ask about the conversation between Michael and Gabriel. It sort of happened while I was typing and it felt right so I left it in. I know what it's about, but it's not going to be explored further in this story or this universe, so if it bothers you that much, just make something up and go with that.

2. I wanted to use a real pub near where I have Ciar living in London, but I was too lazy to look it up so I asked someone who lived in London most of her life. She said it was a safe bet that there'd be a 'Rose and Crown' within walking distance of anywhere in central London because apparently there are a lot of them.

DISCLAIMER: Yeah, still not mine.

* * *

_That night, they dreamed, their visions twisting together until they were one, one horrible nightmare of the end. _

_At the time, they did not know that they were sharing a dream. How could they, when they were not even really aware that the other existed, or, in the case of one, that his dreams were more than just imagination, that they were real?_

_They did not know that what they experienced was very close to the same thing, though what they interpreted it as was different. _

_One saw it as dying. He experienced the horror of realising that he was being hunted. He ran, faster, further than any human should have been able to, but he wasn't human and he felt no fatigue, did not need to breathe except as habit. _

_And still it wasn't fast enough, wasn't far enough, and he could not fight. He was surrounded._

_The world spun around him as he writhed, the pain invading every part of his being, and as the world faded all he saw was a pair of horrified blue eyes and an exquisitely manicured hand reaching towards him._

_The other saw it as something worse than death: the experience of being without emotions, the one you care about - not just darkness but something completely void of everything except himself, and in this dream he was just as void as everything around him. He felt the lance of fear as he realised, and he ran. Faster, further than any human would have been able to, but he was not human either, and like the other he felt no fatigue, needed no oxygen. _

_And he wasn't fast enough either, came too late, could not stop it._

_He watched with horrified eyes as it happened, his hands reaching out desperately, unable to believe the truth, and he fell into a spiral of endless darkness with no end._

_And in two separate flats in London, two young men woke, one screaming from unimaginable, impossible pain, the other weeping for the loss of someone that he had known all his life and yet never met, and for the fear of falling into darkness like that again, the terror of experiencing that nothingness._

_And they do not know it yet, but that is the end. They will dream no more. _

_See? I told you that it was important. _

_—  
_

Ciar slid off of the bed and onto the floor, drawing up his knees and burying his face in his hands, panting. A dream. Just a dream.

_Just a dream_, he repeated mentally, turning it into a kind of mantra. _Just a…_

But the pain had felt so real. He'd felt his soul being ripped apart, felt it dissolve. He'd felt the fear, seen the jeering faces of the angels that had hunted him, seen – hurt jolted through him as he remembered his angel's face, the desperate hand that reached out to him and passed straight through his fading form.

He shook his head desperately, stood. He was slick with sweat and definitely needed a shower.

Normality. That was what he needed. Shower, coffee, work. And after work…

…To hell with it. It was Friday. He'd go get a drink.

—

Alex swallowed hard, and glanced down at his shaking hands, swiping at his wet cheeks, before wrapping his arms around himself. A dream. Of course. Of course it was just a dream.

The horror was still there, in the background. He tried to reassure himself. The darkness wasn't real. It was just a stupid nightmare. He wasn't numb or lost. He wasn't falling. He was right here. He was fine.

He took a deep breath and swung his legs out of bed. They almost crumpled beneath him as he stood up. He felt weak and shaky.

He shook his head in annoyance at himself. With a conscious effort, he forced himself to stop trembling and headed for the shower. He wasn't going to let a stupid nightmare mess with his plans for the day. The bookstore had been closed when he'd gone there the night before, but this time he was determined to speak with Samantha.

—

In a bookstore in Soho, a young woman removed a pair of glasses and traced a circle hidden in the pattern of the carpet with her foot. It glowed brightly, and a pair of white wings burst from her back, her short blonde hair darkening to shiny black and flowing down to her waist.

She'd been thinking about it for the entirety of the previous day. Ciar was angry at her. He'd spoken to Alex. They didn't need her any more. It was time to go… home. Somehow, the thought didn't enthuse her. Earth was more fun.

She spread her wings and gave a powerful flap, lifting from the ground. As her feet left the carpet, the light of the circle spread like oil running over the bottom of a frying pan, rose up, and formed the portal to Heaven above her head. The light surrounded her as she passed through. If she had been mortal, rather than divine, it would have blinded her.

She burst through the portal on the other side – from above, it looked rather like some kind of pond – and her feet touched the ground with a tap.

"What are you doing here?" demanded a surprised voice as the light faded.

Lailahel looked up. "I live here, Gabriel," she said gloomily, pushing past the Archangel. His eyes narrowed.

"Lailahel. Your mission is not complete," he said sharply, standing straight. "Why have you returned to Heaven?"

She stopped. When he spoke like that, he wasn't her friend, he wasn't the well-meaning-but-sometimes-meddling 'big brother' figure to all the lesser angels… he was her superior, and she couldn't deny him. She turned reluctantly. "They do not need me any longer. They have made contact with one another. Ciar is aware of the truth. It is only a matter of time until Alex, too, figures it out."

He eyed her sharply. "Laila…"

She clenched her fists. He could see right through her. He always could. "Ciar's angry with me for hiding the truth from him," she said finally.

"And you're going to give up because of that?"

"Like I said, they don't need me anymore," she snapped.

"They do."

The conviction in his voice made her pause. She sighed as realisation dawned. "You Saw this coming from the very start, didn't you?"

After a moment, he nodded slowly. "I am sorry that I could not tell you, but this was all a part of the Great Plan. You, too, have a part in that Plan. You _must_ return to Earth."

She fiddled with a lock of hair – a habit that she had picked up in her time pretending to be a human. He noticed. "Ask," he ordered her gently.

"Will Ciar forgive me?"

Gabriel hesitated. "I don't know," he admitted. "I'm sorry."

She crossed her arms, staring past him, and then sighed again and nodded. "Alright. I cannot refuse a direct order, even if I wanted to."

He held up an arm and stopped her as she went to walk past him. "Laila… Don't return just because I order it. You must return because you believe it to be the right course."

She hesitated, biting her lip. "I… I _do_ believe that I was wrong to leave because of one setback. I have watched over them for more than twenty-five years. It would be wrong of me to not see this through to the very end, and foolish of me to give up over that one setback. I was not thinking straight." Her head drooped slightly. "Perhaps the others were right. I am too emotionally involved…"

Gabriel shook his head, resting his hand on her shoulder. "No. In this case, your emotional involvement is a good thing. Now…" he stepped back. "Go, Guardian Lailahel. Complete your mission."

Laila nodded, and flapped her wings once again, jumping back into the portal and passing back through to Earth.

"Gabriel."

He turned, nodding to the angel behind him. "Michael."

Michael moved to stand next to the blonde Archangel. "You are sure that this is how things are meant to be?" he asked, after a moment. Gabriel nodded.

"Aye, brother. She has a role to fulfil, just like the rest of us."

"And them?"

"They have nearly fulfilled their role, such as it is now. They deserve their chance at happiness." He hesitated. "Once, I believed that they would be the ones…"

Michael nodded. "As did I. I wonder if, perhaps, our Father's Plan is far Greater than any of us realise." He paused, thoughtfully. "Certainly, it seems as if it perhaps _can_ be changed..." He turned to Gabriel. "You are _certain_ that she is capable?" he asked, sharply.

Gabriel nodded once more. "The foundations have already been laid."

"We will not tell the others of this?" questioned Michael.

"No. Not yet."

—

Lailahel reappeared in the back room of the shop to the sound of insistent knocking. A glance at the clock informed her that it was just past noon. Winching her wings back in and using a small miracle to set the guise of Samantha Lynn back in place, she stepped through to the front of the shop and opened the door to let Alex in.

"Alex," she greeted.

"Samantha... Are you okay?"

She blinked in feigned surprise. "Alex, don't be silly. Of course I'm fine."

"Are you sure? You don't look fine."

She smiled at him. "You're a sweetheart, Alex. Really, I'll be -" She broke off as she momentarily felt a burst of Angelic Presence in the back room. "Ah... Since you bothered to come all this way to see me, why don't you stay for some tea?" she suggested.

"That would be lovely," responded Alex, following her. He still looked suspicious.

Once in the back room, she directed him towards a chair and busied herself in the small kitchen area, pausing to grab the note only once the kettle was on and the mugs set out. She unfolded it. It was simple, only one line long, and it wasn't signed.

_Tonight, Ciar will be in the Rose and Crown Pub._

She frowned. The note itself wasn't particularly strange, but the handwriting was. It wasn't the messy scrawl that Gabriel had adopted these days. It wasn't even the flowing cursive that Raphael used – not that he often had cause to contact her – or the elegant, curling script of Uriel (who had contacted her once, early on in her twenty-five years on Earth, asking her to procure a particular type of paint. She supposed there was a good reason why the Archangel had felt it neccessary to use human paints rather than anything that could be miracled up, which was, generally, of better quality. Research, perhaps). No... This was the sharp, purposeful lettering of Michael.

"Why would _Michael_ leave me this?" she muttered to herself, thinking of the dark-haired Angel of War.

"Sorry, what?" called Alex from the other side of the room.

She looked up in surprise, and then smiled. "Nothing," she told him, crumpling the note up and tossing it in the general direction of the bin, which moved slightly when Alex wasn't looking, to ensure that she didn't miss. The kettle boiled.

Lailahel poured the tea and passed a cup to Alex, settling into the chair opposite him and leaning on the table. _Why should I need to know where Ciar will be toni- Oh!_

And then she knew what she needed to do.

"Say, Alex?"

"Hm?" he responded, blowing on his tea.

"There _is_ something I'd like to ask you to do for me, actually."

He took a sip of tea and gestured for her to go on.

"Well... There's this place I go to sometimes of a weekend when I'm feeling a little down, and I don't want to go on my own this time because it would remind me why I was feeling upset, so... I was wondering if you'd come with me?"

He swallowed. "Certainly. Where is it?"

She smiled. "The Rose and Crown Pub."

He winced. "Ah... I'm not much of a pub person."

She turned wide, hopeful eyes on him. "Please, Alex? It would mean a lot to me, and I don't really have anyone else that I can ask."

He sighed. "...Fine… Just one condition."

"What?"

"No karaoke."

—

He sat hunched over his table in the corner, nursing a glass of red wine that Samantha had pushed on to him. He felt incredibly out of place and uncomfortable.

A tipsy young man passed by, and then stumbled into his table, spilling his drink, as a rather more drunk man bumped into him. He cursed. "S'rry," he told Alex, slurring slightly, and then frowned. "Hey. Y're Alex, aren't you?"

Alex looked up in surprise. "Oh. Ciar, isn't it?"

Ciar nodded and cast his eye over the table. "Y'don't strike me as bein' the type to go t'pubs..." He raised an eyebrow. "Y're alone?"

Alex blinked. "No, I'm with..." He paused. "Uh. She's vanished..." he said sheepishly.

Ciar chuckled, and settled into the seat opposite him. "No need for you t'be alone, eh Blondie?"

—

A couple of hours later, and he was drunk. Very drunk. But not as drunk as his companion. With copious amounts of alcohol, the awkward stage of having talked a little but not really enough to be good friends had been very quickly passed through, and the two of them were thoroughly engaged in an argument, though neither of them could quite remember what it was about at this precise moment in time. It wasn't stopping them.

"Nah, nah… 'S more like a nightingale!" argued Alex, gesturing wildly. He paused, frowning. "D's it feel t'you like w've h'd this c'nv'rs'shun b'fore?" he slurred. Ciar held the bottle of wine upside down over his glass and scowled at the single drop that came out, before his brain processed what Alex had said and he put it down, scratching his head. "Yeeaaaahhh."

Ciar half slumped over the edge of the table, and Alex began to doodle patterns in a puddle of spilled beer on the tabletop. Silence fell between the two of them, partially confused, partially thoughtful and partially drunken.

After a minute, Ciar straightened up. "'S like a dream I h'd, 'nce."

"Y'h! M'too."

They made shaky eye contact for a moment, before Ciar broke it, looking down at his hands on the table. "Always h'd dreams l'ke th't," he managed after a moment. "Like… 'nother whole life..."

"Y'h," responded Alex softly, tapping the edge of his empty glass with one finger. "Like… y'wake up in… inna… inna morn'n, an, an… an… y'd'nno who y'_are_."

Their eyes met again, silent communication passing between them, drunken realisations coming to the forefront…

And then the moment passed, and Alex twisted around. "M're wine!"

—

It is late at night, so late that it's early. Outside of a pub in London, two young men, one very drunk, the other even drunker, stumble down the street supporting each other, watched over from the rooftops by a smiling Guardian Angel.

One staggers, falls, half drags the other down with him, only to be pulled back to his feet with a chastising "Now, r'lly, m'dear!"

They've only just met, and yet they've known each other forever.

In the morning, they will pay the price for their indulgence, but for now they don't care.

They laugh uncontrollably, their voices rising, curling together, twisting around the rooftops to be joined by a third voice, a woman's – no, an angel's – which tangles protectively around theirs. They're loud, too loud, but they don't care what the world thinks.

They never have.

* * *

See you for the epilogue next week, then.


	10. In Paradiso

So, here we are at the end of the journey... a journey that has taken a few months for me. It's strange.

I apologise profusely for the fact that, once again, this update is a day late. My internet decided to go down last night and I was only just able to get it working again.

Title of the chapter means, fairly obviously, 'In Paradise'

And I still don't own it.

* * *

_He lies on the grass, arms folded behind his head, relishing the warmth of the sunlight on his skin. A shadow falls across him, and he cracks his eyes open. The apple tree flourishes, growing in front of his very eyes, the branches curling together, leaves sprouting and fruit ripening._

_He stands. One of the apples wobbles and drops. He puts out a hand to catch it, raising it to his lips to take a bite as he turns, stepping through the doorway into the cool gloom of the church. _

_He walks down the aisle, his footsteps echoing in the silence, and stops as a sandy ginger tomcat runs over to wind around his legs. He bends down to run his knuckles over the soft fur and smiles, settling down on the pew. The cat curls up in his lap, purring happily, and he closes his eyes, resting his arms on the back of the bench and leaning back._

_There is a rustle behind him, and he opens his eyes again, to the sight of a beautiful garden. The ruins of the church are still around him, ivy tangling around the columns. He turns – half noticing that the pew that he sits on is on fire – and meets the eyes of the dark-haired angel. She smiles sadly at him, her eyes seeming to ask for forgiveness. He nods, and then reaches out, offering the apple to her._

_She plucks it delicately from his hand, raises it to her mouth and sets her teeth against the red skin…_

_—  
_

He jerks awake and blinks in confusion, before his mind clears and he realises that it was just a dream.

A perfectly ordinary, makes-no-sense dream, just like those that any normal person had.

He stares unseeingly at the ceiling, his eyes out of focus. It's almost strange, having that kind of dream after so many years. He can't even remember the last time that his dreams hadn't… What? Made sense? Hadn't been about what he now knew to have been his previous life? He mulls over the revelation. That was a strange thing to think about. All those crazy things he'd dreamed had been _real_. He'd helped to stop the A_pocalypse_.He shakes his head. Beyond belief. Except that it wasn't, really. He has all the proof that he needs to know that it was really real.

It's still half-dark, light just beginning to peek through the gap in the curtains, and he can dimly hear the sound of the cars, but, then, it never stops in London, and he is so accustomed to it now that he hardly notices it. Turning and slightly lifting his head from the pillow, he squints at the clock through the gloom. 5:15 a.m. Plenty of time left until he needs to get up for work. He lets his head hit the pillow again, turning to look back at the ceiling through half-closed eyes.

He smiles contentedly, relishing the feel of the warm arm that lies draped across him, the weight of a head on his chest, the soft hair tickling his skin. He lifts a hand to slightly ruffle the tangled hair, chuckling quietly as his companion makes a muffled noise in response, burying his face further into his chest. He is still fast asleep.

He relaxes, letting his head drop to one side, one arm curling around his companion's shoulders as he drifts back into sleep.

Everything is right with the world.

—

In a place deep within the centre of Heaven, an angel sings. She sings not in the language of angels, as one might expect, but in English. Her voice rises, twisting around the columns of the Kingdom of Heaven, curling gently around the pulsing orbs that are the life-timers of the newly born spirits that it is her job to protect. Her song speaks to any that care to listen, telling tales of the wonders of Earth, and of love that never dies, love that surpasses everything. There is joy in her song, a strange, foreign joy that others of her kind cannot understand. But she understands it well, for even such a short time on Earth as twenty-six years has allowed her to develop some very human characteristics, including a sense of humour and a more than rudimentary understanding of sarcasm. It was, she reflects as she sings, no wonder that her two charges had 'gone native', so to speak, in their previous lives.

She raises a hand to the side of her face, brushing at her long mane of black hair, and half turns, her lips twisting into a smile, the final note that she holds dying away as she beholds her new companion. "Come to visit?"

The Archangel smiles, settling down next to her. "I have," he says, flashing her a crooked grin, his warm brown eyes sparkling with amusement. His mirth is infectious, and she finds herself grinning in response.

He leans back comfortably, against a pillar. "Are you happy?"

She blinks in surprise at the unexpected question. "What an odd thing to ask. Why shouldn't I be happy? My old charges are happy, are they not?"

"You misinterpreted my question," he notes, looking at her sidelong. "Are _you_ happy, Laila? For yourself? Are you happy to be doing this again?" He makes a sweeping gesture, indicating the room around them.

Lailahel sighs, looking down at her hands. "I can't complain," she says quietly. "It's still a lovely job, and it's what I was created to do. But… I miss Earth."

He folds his arms, nodding thoughtfully, his eyes staring somewhere past the orbs. "I thought so."

"Why do you ask?"

He stands, turning back to her. "What if I told you that we think we've found a job for you that suits your skills far better than this one?"

Lailahel hesitates, and then stands as well. "But who will look after them?" She nods her head towards the spirits.

Gabriel smiles. "We'll find someone. You don't _have_ to take the job, of course. It's your choice. I just thought you might like it."

She raises an eyebrow. "Well, go on then."

"As you're no doubt aware… there has not been an angel stationed on Earth since the Fall of the previous Guardian. We think you would be the perfect candidate to take over."

She gapes at him. "Really?"

He nods, and laughs as her face lights up. "I'd _love_ to!" she exclaims.

"Well, then… Off you go, Lailahel, Guardian of Earth."

She throws her arms around him momentarily, and is gone, her white robes changing, as she runs, into the Earth garments that she had worn as Lily Hill.

Her wings snap open and she jumps into the portal, visualising in her mind's eye the back room of the bookshop that had become, somehow, her home. The divine light fades, the shining circle disappears back into the pattern of the carpet, and she grins.

_Earth. _There really is no place like it.


End file.
